


Either/Or

by coeurastronaute



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: A series of prompts and shorts, F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-13
Updated: 2018-11-05
Packaged: 2019-06-27 02:11:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 14,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15675924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coeurastronaute/pseuds/coeurastronaute
Summary: A bunch of shorts and prompts





	1. Always

**Author's Note:**

> Supercorp fic of what goes through Lena’s brain every time she sees Kara?

With a yawn, she digs the tips of her fingers into the corners of her eyes and presses until she sees galaxies appear. The rubbing and the forming of entire universes behind her eyelids is a nice escape from the exhaustion that likes to sneak its way into the office around two in the morning and curls up in a little ball beneath her desk.

For the past hour, the numbers on the screen and the numbers on the spreadsheets all dance and mingle until she can’t keep them straight for longer than a few seconds at a time, but with another black coffee and stretch of her legs, bare feet padding along the marble floor, she’s back to looking at them again, furrowing and fighting away at what mere mortals would recognize as their limit.

Lena Luthor didn’t have a limit. She didn’t have time to have a limit.

“Working late again, Ms. Luthor?” Supergirl asks from the balcony. She stands, strong and firm at the precipice of entering, oddly afraid to take that final step, as if it would mean something.

Before she even looked up, Lena smiled to herself and read the same string of digits six times before giving up and meeting Supergirl’s gaze. For a moment, for the smallest of instants, she was sure she could see Kara there. Deep down, she knew they were the same, and yet there was this difference, this clear disconnect between the entities that inhabited the same body.

“And you aren’t burning the midnight oil?” she countered, teasing and coy. “People are going to start to talk with how much you show up on my balcony.”

“Best balcony in town.”

The smile slid up to her eyes, crinkling the corners slightly. She was the warmth of the summer. That first day of heat that made everything feel sticky and smothered. That was Kara’s smile. This warmth and brightness that was the sun on cloudless days, the same kind of sun that made blue seem to turn to white at noon.

“I suppose you’re here to make me go home, call it a night?”

“No ma’am,” Supergirl shook her head, slightly bashful and shucksing herself. “I wouldn’t be brave enough to think anyone could tell Lena Luthor what to do, even if it was for her own good.”

“Supergirl, not brave enough?”

“I’ve seen the wrath too much. Once bitten, twice shy.”

“I don’t know, I heard you like a little biting,” Lena teased.

Red flared up through Supergirl’s neck and onto her cheeks. She sputtered slightly and nervously played with her fingers, afraid to look at the pretty girl behind the desk.

“Seems I was wrong, and you are plenty awake.”

“My brain is apt to be dirty anytime you show up,” she promised, gazing back down at her sheets for just a second longer before deciding it was enough.

All innocent and seemingly unaware of the effect she had on the CEO, Supergirl blushed even harder, until she was the color of her cape.

“You are very honest for being after midnight.”

“The best time to tell the truth,” Lena decided, closing her folders and reaching to click the monitor on her desk. “Do you think you could give me a lift home, Supergirl?”

“I definitely would love to do that.”

Lena pushed in her chair and finally made her way toward the balcony where she let out a little yawn. It didn’t matter though. She was close enough to Kara to feel something. With a smile, she wrapped her arms weakly around Kara’s neck and melted.

There was a feeling, this exact feeling that came just from looking at Kara, and it was the equivalent of this feeling of her arms encompassing an entire sun. Arms wrapped around her waist and Lena dug her nose into the soft skin at Supergirl’s throat. She inhaled it and she hid as best she could.

“I missed you today,” Lena whispered.

“Me too,” Kara promised.

* * *

On stage, the world was a different place. All ideas of far away places ceased to exist as possible escapes. On stage, with the lights and the cameras waiting for a stumble, with the reporters with the recorders and the deadlines and the passive, blank faces that hid maniacally whirring brains, teeth sharpened and waiting to draw blood like a pack of hyenas or school of piranhas.

Lena cleared her throat and prepared for the next question. She knew it wouldn’t be about the new Women in STEM initiative her company rolled out. She knew it wasn’t going to be about the growth in the last fiscal quarter. She knew what was coming.

And so she cleared her throat and smiled that smile, that cocky, unafraid smile, and she pointed toward someone in the press pool.

“With the rise in alien attacks over the past few years and the rhetoric exhibited after your brother’s arrest, what do you have to say about the new accusations that LCorp has been funneling tech to extremist groups?”

Halfway through the question, Lena already knew her form response. She’d given it about a dozen times already, and she’d give it a million more. Probably until she died. Hell, even on her death bed, probably.

The only saving grace, the thing that made her stop before she got sassy, was a certain pair of blue eyes in the audience. Every time Lena saw that reporter, she smiled to herself. It was like seeing an ally, seeing a friend in a room full of strangers. She felt that same kind of safety that came when Kara’s arms were around her.

Kara winked and smiled when she caught Lena’s eye, earning a smile and pause before she was back to business.

“I cannot say enough how much I, personally, condemn the actions of my family in the past, nor can I express how deeply saddened I am that people continue to believe in that form of hate and political conversation through violent means,” she explained. “Never, will LCorp aid or abet any kind of civil disruption or will we intend to harm anyone, regardless of where they are from.”

From her seat, Kara gave her a little nod and saw Lena relax. She’d heard that exact answer as it was rehearsed and analyzed almost every morning for the past few weeks. It rolled out beautifully, and she found herself proud.

All that Lena could do was smile and move along to the next one.

* * *

“I’m exhausted,” Lena lamented as she made her way into her apartment. Her bag was plopped on the ground, her blazer was tossed to the couch. “Frank Wilder is absolutely tedious. I hate him and I hate having to listen to his stupid stories.”

The apartment didn’t answer back, but Lena moved through to the kitchen. She picked up a glass and a bottle of wine, filling it as she tugged her heels off. With a generous sip, she sighed and leaned against the counter before pulling her hair up into a ponytail.

“I’m not going to do anything but run a long bath and make you give me a massage.”

There still wasn’t an answer, but Lena knew Kara was home. She didn’t know how at first, but her body picked up on how the air was different. The place was charged toward her girlfriend, the only wrinkle being that she had to find her.

Armed with a newly refilled glass of wine and bare feet, Lena wove through the halls in search of the one person who would make her headache disappear and her body relax.

Halfway toward her room, Lena heard the noise in the gym and smiled to herself.

Sprinting at an unbearably high speed, Supergirl sweat and focused as her headphones blared some kind of noise. Lena realized that she wasn’t the only person who had a bad day. She watched the blur and waited until she stopped, balancing herself on the edge of the track of the special machine that converted her movement into energy.

Sweaty, heaving, Kara tried to catch her breath. She wiped her arm along her forehead and Lena simply drank it all in, enjoying the abs and muscles and arms and everything on display. She was exhausted but something gave her a fourth wind.

“Hey,” Kara smiled as she tugged her headphones off.

“Hello there.”

“You okay?”

“Much better now.”


	2. Firsts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Can you write sweet/fluff Supercorp making love for the first time they beinh so eager but trying to be careful about Kara’s superpowers? I love your writing!

There were steps to everything in life. Different milestones were reached and things followed a systematic order which was, despite all other confusing parts of being alive, somewhat of a relief to the youngest Luthor.

At sixteen she got her driver’s license, and subsequently, a new Aston Martin that was used primarily by her driver. At seventeen, she graduated and started college, moving away from her family and starting new. At eighteen, Lena voted in her first election and fell in love for the first time. At twenty-one, she got legally drunk. At twenty-three she took over her family’s company due to complete negligence on the part of a homicidal megalomaniac she once called brother. At twenty-five, she met Kara Danvers.

Just normal, everyday milestones that every growing girl experienced.

There were also dating steps and rituals which helped Lean keep her life in order. She craved balance and some kind of sorting of the chaos of her family and the city and the times in which they were living. But there were rules to everything. She loved rules.

Date number one was the Get To Know You date. And despite being friends, they did just that, eating really good Chinese food in the back of a slener restaurant that had four tables and too many knicknacks. They got to know each other in a different way, in the dating kind of way, with giddy smiles and furtive glances and bitten lips and soft blushes.

There were supposed to be two ends to a date like that, a first date. There was a kiss and promise of more, or a polite “thanks for the good time,” type of ending. Lena got ditched just as they were about to get the check, which left her confused.

But three hours later, Supergirl showed up on her balcony and apologized, before kissing her deep and purposeful, leaving Lena in a daze before fluttering off with a grin.

Date number two was the Flirt and Hold Hands date. And despite being busy, they each carved out time and spent it at the museum before a longer kiss goodnight. It got damn near dirty even in its intensity.

Date number three was the Accidental date. Kara showed up with dinner when Lena was busy on the end of quarter numbers for a board meeting. It ended with a quick, blushing kiss as Kara excused herself to let Lena get back to work when they finished.

Everyone knew that if date number four came without anything more physical, that it was the sex date. Lena knew it. She expected it. She prepared for it. And then it came to that time and she was ditched in favor of a fire on the highway.

Date number five then. That was it.

It was date number five and Lena was ready to fireproof the whole city and pay every bad guy to behave themselves. She couldn’t help it. Kara whimpered and bit her lip and kissed her neck and had those abs and liked to squeeze Lena’s ass from time to time as she pushed their hips closer together.

“If you leave a mark, I swear,” Lena murmured as lips moved to the base of her throat, already sucking on her neck. A small chuckle came with a slight shift.

Straddling Kara, the meal Lena prepared herself was forgotten in the dining room. The candles were burning in the large penthouse apartment, so that there was just a gentle glow about the living room. Lips dipped to her cleavage and hands gripped her hip as she ground into Kara’s lap.

“You are so sexy,” Kara complained.

There was a breathless whimper as Lena found some friction, her movements growing faster. Kara kissed back to neck and melted as Lena’s tongue took control.

With shaky hands Kara tugged at the shirt until she played with the creamy skin of Lena’s back and ribs.

“Darling, can we take this to the bedroom,” Lena moaned as cool air met heated skin on her chest.

“Wow,” Kara leaned back and gulped, finally coming through the haze to see the black bra on Lena. “You’re… you’re… wow.”

“Your a fan of boobs, aren’t you?” she grinned, sitting back slightly and appreciating the way Kara looked at her. That was new and fun and made her feel oddly confident.

“And this.” Kara squeezed her ass and smiled.

As if taking the challenge, Lena reached behind her back and unhooked her bra.

The hands on her hips tightened as the lace slid down her arms and fell to the floor. She watched Kara’s eyes grow bigger, watched her pupils dilate.

In just a second of perfection, Lena immediately started to wince and feel pain on her hips until she yelped and wiggled until the hands on her hips released and she found herself rolled over to the couch itself as Kara stood up quickly and moved away.

“I’m so sorry. I’m so so sorry.”

“I’m fine. I’m fine. What happened?”

“I didn’t… I forgot.”

Lena looked down at her hips and saw bruises forming already. Her muscles hurt with Kara’s grip that tightened like a vice. She looked back at the shaken girl backing away from her in the living room.

Kara turned around refused to look at the topless beauty that she’d made feel pain.

“I’m sorry. I have to– I should– I’m going to go.”

“Kara, wait.”

“No no, I can’t. I’m sorry.”

Before Lena could do anything else, Supergirl was gone, and she was left, half naked and with an oddly painful waist, and ten individual bruises forming on her pale skin.

It was in that moment, as she looked at the purpling there, that she realized that dating Kara Danvers was a whole new milestone, and thus didn’t have any rules at all to help her navigate it. But the look she’d given Lena before she left meant it was all worth it.

* * *

For nearly a day, Kara avoided her phone completely. She knew that waiting on it would be missed calls and texts from a certain CEO, and after what she’d done, she couldn’t bring herself to see such easily given forgiveness when it could have been so much worse.

And it could have. Kara could lift a car and toss it into the stratosphere. She could bend steel and break bones with flick of her wrist. And she’d almost done that with Lena. She let herself forget that she wasn’t human.

It happened so naturally. Their relationship had already been moving at a very slow and reasonable pace, of which she was eternally grateful. And it did seem natural and good for a half-naked Lena to end up in her lap. But Kara would never be prepared for the actual appearance of it. She’d never experienced want like that, and she didn’t know what it meant.

So she flew away and tried to figure out what it all meant.

“Well this is a nice surprise,” her cousin greeted her as he adjusted his bag and made his way toward reception. Immediately, his face lit up and his smile eased upon seeing Kara. In a second, she was swallowed up into a large hug.

“I as in the area.”

“Right,” Clark nodded, searching her face. “Nothing else?”

“Do you have time to get lunch?”

It was harder for Kara to adjust to earth. It was a lot more of changing her fixed patterns and life on Krypton. Clark didn’t have any of that. He was from Earth, regardless of how much anyone wanted to claim he was an alien.

Sometimes, it infuriated Kara, and yet, it was situations like the one she found herself stuck in, that she was grateful for his expertise.

“Oh man, Kara, I’m not sure I’m the right person to talk to about this,” he winced upon hearing her babbling confession of what happened.

Kara sipped her drink and leaned back in the chair at the table on the corner. They had a pizza split between them that wouldn’t last long. She blushed.

“There’s no one else. Believe me. I would have rather gone anywhere else.”

Clark set his jaw and nodded, prepared to be the guiding light, or at least try. Both were uncomfortable and antsy with the conversation about personal matters. Intimate matters.

“So you were getting serious with someone, and you got a little overzealous with your powers?” he checked, earning a nod. “And then you ran away without talking to them about it?”

“I apologized.”

“Was she okay?”

“She said she was, but there were bruises,” Kara swallowed and shook her head. “I did that to her.”

“You know how to be careful. What happened?”

“I mean, I looked at her, and without clothes. It was a lot,” she shrugged. “Did you ever mess up before?”

“Yeah of course,” he promised. “You just have to remember to hold onto anything else. You be as gentle as possible. Let them tell you when to add more. And talk to her. You’re going to have sex with her, you should be able to talk about it.”

“Easier said than done,” Kara snorted as she grabbed another slice of pizza. “We’re friends. This is all new. And I really like her. I like her so much.”

Taking some pity on his cousin, Clark sighed and sipped his drink before attempting to be more helpful.

“You won’t hurt her. You won’t. Humans aren’t made of glass and paper. Just be careful. I know its a lot to think about, but also maybe tire yourself out first? When Lois and I started… dating… I would do laps around the planet before a date. I’d lift planes and punch concrete until I couldn’t move, to avoid hurting her. But I grew used to her. Comfortable.”

“I can do that.”

“It’s just at first.”

“Can we pretend this conversation never happened?” Kara asked, nervous still with this new knowledge.

“God, yes.”

* * *

After two days, there really wasn’t anything Lena expected from Kara Danvers. In fact, she was almost convinced that she’d run Supergirl out of town.

With a slight wince, she ran her hand absently along the healing bruises that were nothing more than faint shadows on her skin. She sipped her wine and flipped through a boring report a second later, annoyed that such good sex bruises were wasted by a good little hero who thought she spooked easier.

After two days, Lena tossed her phone down one more time and huffed, very annoyed and honestly just wishing to hear from her friend again.

“Before you say anything, I have to apologize,” a voice began, speaking quickly, nearly making the CEO choke on her wine.

The doors to her balcony blew open, almost after Kara appeared in front of her.

“I really need you to knock or at least not do the zoom thing,” Lena shook her head and tried to catch up.

“I’m so sorry I hurt you, Lena. It scared me. And I’m sorry I just left,” Kara ignore her and kept talking. “You are just so pretty, and I couldn’t think straight. I just wanted to hold on. I can’t say I won’t hurt you again, only that I don’t want to ever do that, but you’re dating a Kryptonian and if you want to… you know… I think we should talk, and Rao, this is painful, but you’re worth this intense embarrassment I’m feeling.”

The quiet came swiftly, and Kara felt earnestly terrified of looking up at the girl she’d just confessed her entire life to and who now had the power to make her stomach keep twisting or settle. But she did look up to a surprised face and a quiet smile.

“We can talk, if you want,” Lena offered quietly. “I might need more wine, but I don’t want to scare you away because I’m just human.”

“Scare me away?” Kara scoffed. “No, no no no. You couldn’t. I just… I can’t… when we… I am very afraid of you, Lena Luthor.”

“I suppose I should be gentle with you then,” she smirked and earned a gulp.

* * *

There were rules that defined all parts of life. Not one thing fell outside the scope of some kind of regulation, and being in love with Supergirl, though a definite rarity and singular situation, sounded like it should have been utter chaos, Lena learned that it was just a lot of different rules.

They set terms, so to speak, after a very awkward and blush-filled conversation that lasted well into a second bottle of wine for Lena. The terms were easy to understand, and Lena knew that she had to be careful of the apparent power she had over the hero.

But just a few nights later, slightly sweaty and almost exhausted, Kara appeared on her balcony for a date, claiming to have exhausted her body to the point of not wanting to move. She asked to take a shower and Lena ordered dinner.

The night followed a familiar course of events though.

Tentatively, Lena kissed Kara’s neck and earned a happy hum. Her hand slid under her shirt and felt the muscles there. She smiled at the reaction she’d earned and continued to taste as much skin as she could.

“I just need you to relax,” Lena whispered. “Can you do that, darling?”

Once more, hands gripped Lena’s hips as they moved together in her bed, already taking the middle of it for themselves.

Dinner was forgotten in the living room. Lena’s pants were somewhere else and Kara’s shirt was on the floor, just out of reach.

“Not when you feel like this,” Kara disagreed. “You are just… goodness.”

Lena didn’t care though. She had a mission. With another kiss she moved to Kara’s chest and earned a moan.

“Let me help you relax.”

“I don’t know– Oh!”

Kara jumped as a hand slid between her legs. Lena didn’t stop though. Instead, she just continued her mission.

“I’ll be gentle,” Lena promised, earning a gulp.


	3. Mad

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Could you do one where Lena keeps getting mad at Kara for breaking her stuff?

Sore. Very sore. Aching, even.

With a groan, Lena rolled over in her empty bed and winced at the pain in her hip. And her back. And her thigh. There was this delicious kind of ache though, beneath the soreness. Lena almost craved it, to wake up and feel absolutely lethargically satisfied. Her girlfriend was more than willing to oblige.

The sun peeked through the curtains as the day wanted to start. Just down the hall from the bedroom, Lena could hear the telltale signs of someone else in her penthouse. The smells wafted in a few seconds later as she found herself mid stretch, and despite the soreness, she moved her legs and kicked off the sheets in search of clothes.

Her feet, however, did not meet air. She did not have to swing herself off of her oversized and much too tall bed, but rather instead immediately hit her feet on the floor, to which Lena squinted and looked around.

Splintered on the edges, the former frame of her bed sat, crumbled beneath the mattress. She pushed her hair away from her face and looked at the headboard, now completely dismantled and missing chunks. She should have remembered something about what happened, but to be honest, she couldn’t find anything in the memories other than Kara.

“Don’t be mad,” Kara appeared, sheepish and holding two cups of coffee as a shield against the inevitable wrath. “I’m sorry. I just couldn’t do anything else.”

Lena pursed her lips and looked at her girlfriend, unamused that she would have to spend her Monday morning shopping for new furniture again.

“You couldn’t do anything else?”

“Well, I just…” she winced and handed over the warm mug. “I couldn’t help myself. I didn’t mean to break it.”

“I really liked this bed.”

“I did too.”

Awkwardly, Kara ran her foot along the back of her shin, and she shifted, holding her own coffee mug with both hands. Just wearing old shorts and an older shirt, her hair was a mess, all messy waves and perfect sleepy bashfulness. It was more difficult to be mad and annoyed at furniture shopping after all of the orgasms and literal bed-breaking sex.

Kara took a sip and she adjusted her glasses, waiting for Lena to forgive her.

“Do you know how expensive this was?” Lena sighed, looking again at the edge of the bed and her feet, now amidst the rubble.

“I don’t know, like six hundred?”

Lena coughed on her coffee and chuckled, making her girlfriend a bit redder in the ears.

“Oh, darling,” Lena smiled and shook her head. “You’re an expensive date, is all I can say.”

“Seven hundred?” Kara cocked her head.

“Sure. Let’s call it that.”

“Stop buying expensive things.”

“Stop breaking expensive things.”

“Eight hundred?”

“You’re going to have to take everything out yourself. I can’t explain to the furniture store why I need another bed. People will start to talk.”

Kara nudged a board with her toe while Lena sipped her coffee.

“I’m sorry. Please don’t be mad.”

“Stop breaking my stuff, Kara.”

“Stop being so sexy.”

“Don’t turn this on me. You’re supposed to control your powers.”

“I can’t help it.”

“I guess no more sex.”

In an instant, Kara snapped her eyes up from the bashful hiding they were doing in her mug, and she frantically searched her girlfriend’s nonplussed face, ascertaining no real answer or if it was a joke or not. Instead, Lena kept a blank face and sipped more coffee.

“Wait, really?” Kara squinted.

All she got was a shrug.

* * *

Even in the uniform, even with the symbol emboldened upon her chest, even with the threat mitigated and peace prevailing over the busy street that the assassination attempt prompted, even with the hearty applause before the street was cordoned off by agents in black suits and bright badges, Supergirl nervously shrunk herself and looked for a way to escape the inevitable wrath that would–

“This was my new car! My brand new car!”

All anger, the purest kind, all of it bundled up in one little package, wrapped up in a pencil skirt and balancing on high high heels that made her ass look absolutely fant–

“You couldn’t throw something else at the goons?!” Lena yelled, hands on her hips as she strut across the street.

Frantically, Kara looked around for anywhere to run to, to escape the inevitable lashing she was about to get. But in the heat of the moment, with a gun pointed at the head of the girl she loved, she didn’t see any other options that what was at hand.

The problem was, she knew how much Lena loved that car. She’d waited eight months for the custom edition, with all of the horsepower a girl could want, in the pretty green, with all of the bells and whistles. Lena spent hours pouring over the booklet, agonizing over the details, lusting after a new toy– something she rarely allowed herself. For hours, Kara listened to Lena give her specifics and watched her countdown the days, saw her put a heart on the date on the calendar.

And she just chucked it across the street, turning the beautiful machine of a car into nothing more than a giant crumpled up mess.

“Do you know how much I wanted that? How long I waited for it?” Lena continued to rant. “That was your big ideal to end it? Just throw something at them.”

“I was– you were– there was–” Supergirl stuttered.

“My car! Do you know how much I spent on it? Do you know how beautiful it was? Do you know how long I’ve been waiting for it?”

“Eight months.”

“Eight damn months!” Lena supplied, too big into her rant to hear anything else.

On the sidewalk a few agents watched the display and sniggered to themselves. The superhero looked to them and then back to the raving Luthor who didn’t seem to need to take a breath or even sit still for a few seconds, but rather continued to yell.

“So, are you mad at me?” Supergirl finally managed to ask, earning nothing but the world’s fiercest glare.

And that was coming from someone with lasers in her eyeballs.

“I can’t even–” the CEO sputtered, left eye twitching. Her neck burned red. “This is by far– I don’t know where– I want to–”

No words seemed to come, and Kara knew that was a bad sign.

“I did it to save your life, Ms. Luthor.”

They stared at each other, standing off and waging a war with just a few glances. Each already knew who won.

“I am unfathomably angry right now. I am going to speak with the DEO claims department to inform them that they just lost a third of their annual budget thanks to their hero’s knack for breaking my things. If you’ll excuse me.”

With a snap of her heels, Lena did an abrupt about-face, the agner tightening the muscles of her neck and shoulders. She still had her hands rooted into fists at her side.

“Yeah, a little mad,” Kara sighed as she pushed off from the ground, already knowing what the next chunk of her day was going to look like as soon as Lena made it home.

For some reason, she wasn’t in a rush.

* * *

“Oops.”

There was a second of silence as the air grew thick with apprehension.

“Oops? What’s oops? What did you do?”

“It was an accident,” Kara hurried, protesting before it could turn into a full fight. She always lost the ones where she broke something. She lost quite often.

Hair tousled and mess, lips puffy from kissing so hard, Lena pulled away from her girlfriend’s neck and met her glance. Kara gulped and slowly removed one hand from the spot where it cracked into the desk, and another held up a bra that’d been torn.

“Kara! Do you know how much that cost!”

“Um,” Supergirl gulped guiltily and looked back at her girlfriend. “A hundred?”

“Stop ruining my nice things!”

“Is this about the car still? Because I apologized about tha–”

“This is about the car, and the bed, and the bras and the skirts, and the desks, and the couch, and the table, and the wall in the beach house, and the ceiling in the cabin, and the helicopter,” Lena listed.

“That wasn’t my fault!”

“Have some self control, Supergirl.”

“You just get me so… so… so…” Kara shook her head and tried to find the words. “I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

“I think you just like getting me mad.”

Kara tried not to smile, but she was guilty of it. Lena rolled her eyes and kissed her girlfriend again.


	4. Dreams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> dont know if youre taking prompts but if it appeals to you at all could you incorporate kara comforting lena after nightmares of her childhood with lilian and lex? i need some protective caring kara and an exploration of lena’s psyche is always fascinating

It was the eighteenth time.

In two months.

That was almost four times per week, though it wasn’t the completely right number. There were sometimes that it was six nights in a row and then not again for ten. It was every other day sometimes, and then none for a week. It was irregular and it was scheduled and consistent, and it was perfect.

But the eighteenth time was different.

Nothing really changed. Not in the newly developing routine that seemed to flow naturally.

Still, Lena came over to Kara’s apartment after a business dinner. Still, she brought Kara the leftovers and dessert. And she earned a kiss that tasted like tiramisu. Somewhere between telling about her day and making out against the wall in the bathroom with a bit of toothpaste in the corner of her mouth, the thunder cracked. Lena complained about a headache and being exhausted. That didn’t stop her from kissing her girlfriend’s neck.

Not one part of the night was terribly different than any other when one slept over. Somehow, as always, Lena ended up in one of Kara’s discarded DEO shirts and old pj pants that were much too long for her legs. She complained about it half-heartedly almost every morning, claiming them to be tripping hazards and a real problem when it came to dating the hero.

And Lena, in her oversized pants and shirt, as always, found herself hiding in Kara’s shoulder and neck as she finally allowed herself a satisfied, peaceful nights’ sleep. And Kara, in her old tank top and underwear, hid in Lena’s hair and fell asleep just as quickly.

It was textbook.

But deep into the night, well into her deepest sleep, Kara felt a tugging at her shirt and a jostling beside her. Immediately, she woke, tensing every muscle and using every extra sense she could to figure out if something was happening. But amidst the quiet and predictable noises of the night, the sloshing of tires outside in a stagnant puddle, the flickering of the streetlight a block down, the startled skatter of a stray cat– nothing was out of place.

And then Lena shifted again, tossing and turning but holding onto Kara’s shirt so tightly that it made her nervous.

“Please…” the sleeping girl half sobbed.

“Hey, Lena, hey,” Kara whispered, pushing away the hair that stuck to her sweaty forehead. “Honey, wake up.”

Gentle as she could, Kara rubbed Lena’s back, talking her down from something she couldn’t understand. It seemed to work, until Lena shot up in bed, her hand moving to her own chest now, finally relinquishing Kara’s shirt. With a gasp, tried to catch her breath which seemed to sound like she’d just run a marathon.

“Hey, you okay, Lee?” Kara cooed.

“What? Yeah, of course. I’m sorry. I just.”

“You were having a nightmare.”

“No, no, I was just. It’s fine. Go back to sleep. I’m going to go grab some water.”

Before she could do anything, Lena was out of the bed, and Kara was left listening to the soft muffle of her pants dragging along the hallway toward the kitchen.

The clock blinked that it was just after four in the morning when the light in the kitchen clicked on and crept its way down toward the bedroom door. Kara listened to the sound of water running and Lena drinking. She gave her a few minutes to compose herself before following down the hall, squinting against the imposition into the dark.

“Want to talk about it?” Kara ventured.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“It’s fine. I’m just a little worried.”

“Don’t be worried,” Lena smiled, composing herself in a short amount of time. A talent that she prided herself on, and that Kara hated.

“You can talk to me, you know?”

“Nothing to talk about.”

“Do you… want to go back to bed?” Kara offered, still unsatisfied with the answer.

“I think I’m going to check on emails and get started with the day,” the CEO decided. “But you should go back to sleep.”

Lena put the glass in the sink and tried not to look at Kara because she knew that Kara would be watching her, and that was too much for her still sleepy but wide-awake brain. She knew that those blue eyes would be sympathetic and warm and want to make her go to sleep, and so she avoided them at all costs.

But the fidgeting didn’t make Kara moved. Instead she stood there and eyed the girl in her kitchen and tried to figure out how to handle the situation. Lena Luthor was a minefield. It wasn’t that there were many mines, just that the few mines that existed, deep in the ground, were sensitive and extremely large.

“I should actually get started on some emails and rewriting that draft I owe Snapper,” Kara decided. “And I’m kind of hungry.”

“You should sleep.”

“Or,” Kara smiled, finally approaching, slow and steady, as one would approach a scared, bristling panther. “We could do some work, get ready, and have breakfast together.”

Despite herself, Lena melted into Kara’s hands as they ran along her arm.

“You can go back to bed. I’m fine.”

“I’m not fine. I’m starving.”

Right on cue, a stomach rumbled and Lena sighed, her nervous fingers working through their anxiety by playing with the her girlfriend’s stretched top.

“We should feed you then.”

With a smile, Kara accepted the hug that came after the words, contradicting their intention and instead rooting them in the kitchen. She felt Lena dig her nose into her shoulder and then her chest and close her eyes, and all Kara could do was wrap her arms around her shoulders and hold them there for just a moment.

* * *

It was a front.

On stage, in all of the interviews, before the crowds and employees, Lena Luthor stood tall and shrugged off the attempt on her life with a noble, endearing kind of strength that pervaded the thoughts and minds of those who weren’t so sure about her. She was the picture of resilience and she was the antithesis to her name.

To Kara, she kept the same kind of unfaltering façade. It wasn’t as vigorously maintained as it was in front of the entire world, but still, when just the two of them made it back to her penthouse, she spent more time reassuring Kara that she was alright than she did believing it, but it didn’t matter.

“Hey, put that ice back on your face,” Kara ordered as she made her way back into the bedroom. “I want a non-black and blue girlfriend as soon as possible.”

“I’m going to freeze my eyeball if I keep it on any longer,” Lena whined, letting her head droop back.

“You’re a literal genius. You know how ice and bruises work. Let me see.”

Tenderly, Kara hovered over Lena’s side of the bed and furrowed as she surveyed the damage caused by the attempted abduction and gun that’d been pointed at her girlfriend’s head not long enough ago for her heart to beat normally. Light fingertips moved along the bone of her cheek and the swelling near her eyebrow before the ice pack was gingerly placed back in its rightful place.

“How do I look, Doc?”

“Like you crawled into the ring with Joe Frazier and forgot how to float like a butterfly.”

“You should see the other guy.”

The bed went back to normal as Kara got up and continued moving around the bedroom. With one eye, Lena watched the tenseness in her girlfriend’s shoulders. She saw the antsy nerves that wouldn’t let her sit still. Instead, Kara plugged in their phones, and powered them down. She went out and double checked the locks on the doors despite being bulletproof. She turned off the lights and finally joined the bed.

“Did you want a pill?” Kara asked, almost ready to hop out of bed again. “Alex gave me some. To help you sleep.”

“Stop worrying. I’m fine.”

“You’re not fine. I know I’m not fine. I lasered a guys hand off that had a gun pointed at your head. If I could take a pill to sleep this all away, I sure would.”

The honesty in the words hung there in the quiet room, and Lena didn’t know how to fix that, so she put her ice pack on the nightstand and turned out her light before making her way back toward her girlfriend in the middle.

“I’m fine. You’re fine. Tomorrow we’ll start over, okay?” Lena whispered, kissing Kara’s jaw and cheek and finally her lips.

There wasn’t anymore energy left in her to do much more, but Lena wrapped her arms around her hero’s ribs and smelled the shower still on her skin. A warm hand slid under her shirt and rubbed the sore muscles of her ribs and back.

“I love you so much,” Kara whispered into the crown of Lena’s head. The words were full of more conviction than normal, as if they were a threat to the universe to try to do anything to mess it up. The fierceness was warm and slumbered in bed with them.

With a small grunt, Lena adjusted and slipped her leg over her girlfriend’s thigh.

“I know. Me too.”

“You sure you don’t want a pill?”

“Shh. I’m trying to sleep here.”

Her pillow snorted at the order and for the first time in a while, Lena felt that happiness sneak back into her bones. Nothing stopped Kara from rubbing her back, even after she fell asleep. Kara felt Lena relax and eventually slip off beside her, and refused to let herself sleep for a little while.

Inevitably, the combination of Lena’s soft breathing and the warmth of her body pressed against her side, the hero felt the heaviness of her eyelids. It wasn’t until she felt the jolt beside her that Kara realized she’d drifted off to sleep.

Tears stained her shirt, bled through to her skin, and she felt the moisture there as the body in her arms was wracked with sobs.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Kara murmured, close to Lena’s forehead. She rubbed her hand along her back again.

Nothing really did anything. Lena’s arms circled tighter around her ribs as her face dug into her shoulder and cried against it.

“Lena, wake up, love.”

Nothing.

“Baby, come on. It’s okay. Please, it’s just a dream. You’re safe,” she promised, moving a little more forcefully to wake up the nightmare-suffering girl.

With a final cry, Lena woke herself and shook her head, quickly opening her mouth to breathe as her nose was currently sniffling and running.

“Oh, Kara,” Lena shook her head and clung again, hiding there. “I thought you were dead. I dreamt it. Don’t die. Don’t die for me.”

“Hey, hey, hey, no one is dying. How many times do I have to keep telling everyone this?”

“Please don’t die,” she continued to mutter, her lungs fluttering frantically as the emotions overpowered her restraint. “I saw it. I watched it happen and I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t and I saw you and oh, please don’t die.”

“I won’t. I won’t,” Kara promised. “Take a deep breath. It was just a silly dream. We’re safe.”

“But I saw you! I saw it and I couldn’t–”

Despite her soreness and the pain in her body, Lena sat up slightly and kissed Kara’s cheek. She cupped her neck and felt her everywhere she could before resting her forehead against her temple.

The hiccups of crying began to finally supside as Lena refused to let go. To her credit, Kara held back just as hard.

“It was just a dream,” Kara promised again.

“I know.”

“The universe isn’t done with us yet, Lena Luthor.” Lena scoffed and shook her head. “Don’t worry about dying. I’ll always save you. And you’ll save me. But I swear, fate doesn’t take away something like this. I have faith in it.”

“So many things want us dead.”

“Yeah, but I haven’t gotten enough of you, and it’s that simple. I refuse to die until I’ve had my fill of being near you, and I don’t see that happening ever.”

“So you’re immortal now?”

“I’m sure I’ll get sick of you in about eighty thousand years.”

“That soon?” Lena smiled, hear heartbeat returning to normal and her eyes growing even more sore from the outburst.

“Yeah well,” Kara shrugged, rolling towards he, careful to tuck her girlfriend’s wounded body under her chin. “You’re a lot of work, Luthor.”

“I’m so sorry. I thought you were dead. I hated it.”

“I know,” she nodded, kissing Lena’s face again. “Do you want a pill?”

“No, no, I’m fine,” she promised, a yawn coming, right on schedule.

“Okay. Let’s sleep then. No more nightmares.”

“Okay,” Lena nodded.

* * *

In some small way, Kara expected it. She skated around the issues as long as she could, coming home early and picking up Lena’s favorite dinner, lighting the candles, pouring the whiskey instead of the wine. Little ways to help her wife relax.

On the day that Lionel Luthor was found dead, Lena didn’t know what to feel, except that she had to feel something, and so when she arrived at home, she appreciated the dinner and the candles and the whiskey that was, in fact, not her first of the day, but rather her fourth. And Lena kissed Kara in that way that said to do anything other than talk about the elephant in the room.

Kara let her wife dig her nails into her shoulders. She let her cling to her so tightly she couldn’t move. She let Lena ache and clutch and not think but need to just feel Kara near her, on her, in her, everywhere. There was a bit of salvation in it, at least for a moment.

Sore and bruised and unable to think of anything else, Lena found herself sweating in the soft sheets and in dire need of another drink and a cigarette. She wanted to hurt herself, and that was how she could do it the easiest without raising any suspicions from her wife. Kara would let her hurt herself in small measures. Tiny, little ways like a cigarette and grabbing her thighs too tightly to leave bruises that would sour and grow painful the following day, and that Lena would push and tease all morning just to feel that dull anger beneath her skin, deep in her muscles.

“I love you, you know that, right?” Kara whispered, running her fingertips along the dip in her wife’s stomach, the little divot that formed between her ribs, just below her sternum.

“I know,” Lena nodded, running her nervous fingers through Kara’s matted hair.

The night was quiet and neither moved. Lena closed her eyes and fell asleep with Kara draped across her hips, anchoring there. She fell asleep with an ache in her bones and heart. She fell asleep despite her own aversion to it.

It wasn’t a surprise that she woke up with the fleeting visions of her father and this agonizing burning in her chest. Or that she couldn’t seem to forget the day that she scraped her knee on her fifth birthday when he taught her how to ride a big kid bike, and he cleaned her wound on the kitchen counter, kissing her knee sweetly when she was patched up. Or that before she woke, she dreamt of the day that he pointed a gun at her and tried to have her killed for where she was taking the company.

The sweat cooled and clung to her body, drying and chilling her to the bone. Tears streamed down her face, dribbling quietly into her hair toward her ears. Slowly, she removed her hand from where it was rooted in her wife’s hair to press it against her chest because she was afraid her heart was ready to hammer right through its cage.

For a few minutes, Lena caught her breath and tried to remain as quiet as possible. She almost thought herself successful in not waking up the slumbering hero on her hip, but there was this nagging feeling of never being able to sneak anything past Kara.

“A nightmare?” Kara whispered, lifting her head and wiping her cheek from the the drool that formed as she slept.

“Yeah,” Lena rasped.

“I’m right here.”

“I know.”

A sleepy Kara lumbered toward her wife and slid beside her in the bed, stretching some of the soreness from her bones from the awkward sleeping position.

“One day,” Kara murmured, kissing Lena’s neck and jaw. “I’m going to give you so many good memories, you won’t have room for any of these bad ones. Then you won’t have bad dreams.”

Despite her fear and her worry and her sadness, Lena smiled in the darkness and rolled to her side, deciding to hide in Kara’s neck this time. She’d sleep well if she felt her, if she could smell her.

“You’re my favorite.”

“I’m serious. Your brain won’t have enough room for the bad memories. I’m going to take all of them away and replace them.”

“I love you.”

“I know,” Kara grinned, her fingertips dragging along her wife’s back.


	5. Press

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How about a oneshot where Kara is secretly collecting all the positive press from magazines, prints of photo shoots, and newspaper articles about Lena because she wants Lena’s legacy to be forever preserved. Lena discovers this to Kara’s mortification, but then she reveals she’s been doing to same for both Supergirl and Kara Danvers. Fluff ensues!

“Are you buying or holding up my line?”

The man at the bodega grunted the words, half hanging out of the window and looking at the tall blonde that lingered there, scanning a newspaper and balanced a stack of files in her arms with a coffee in the other hand.

“I’m sorry, I’m just–” Kara shifted and juggled. “I have change. Just the paper and the candy.”

“You know the rules,” he chastised. “You can’t keep holding up the line.”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Anzari. I got distracted.”

“You’re always distracted and holding up my line. I only let you shop here so I can tell people a famous writer shops here. You’re too much trouble.”

“Thank you. It won’t happen again,” she smiled, charming him once again. “Have a great day!”

Quickly, Kara bounced her way through the crowd on her way to work, flipping through the paper while she balanced everything in her arms. She found the article on a certain CEO and smiled as she rushed into the elevator, cramming herself in, and allowing a few moments to read someone rave about her favorite person on the planet.

The contents of her arms scattered across her desk when she made it finally, though she let herself take a second to stare at a tiny black and white picture of Lena Luthor at a hospital fundraiser the night before. She was beautiful and she was smiling, perfectly put together for the media and the unveiling of a new wing she’d helped fund as they hoped to raise more to build another.

And Kara missed it because of a house fire and a mugging and a tip about alien tech runners that’d been terrorizing the town. She was supposed to be the date to the beautiful girl in the paper. She was supposed to see that dress in person. Instead, she got in so late, she couldn’t even allow herself to wake up the sleeping executive.

 _Good morning, beautiful_ , Kara typed a message as she smiled fondly at her phone. _Can I interest you in some dinner tonight? I’ll cook._

Kara gave the office a cursory glance and cut out the article from the paper, casually tucking it into her date book and tossing the paper in her trash. A minute later, she heard a loud “Ponytail!” rip across the bullpen, and she was thrust into the day.

 _I’ll bring wine and that little red number you like_ , Lena texted back while Kara was in a meeting.

* * *

“Jess, can you cancel my dinner tonight?” Lena muttered as she typed out a text on her phone, smiling devilishly to herself.

“The one you made me set up last night?”

“Yes, that one. Send over my apologies and a gift,” she muttered. “Reschedule for next week, please?”

The secretary made a few notes on her tablet before handing over the stack of papers she accumulated from all around the city and country, a few internationals as well. She had a routine to her mornings, and keeping her boss occupied for a little while helped. This was how she did it.

“Could you send a dozen tulips to Kara’s office? With a dozen donuts?”

“You’re sending your girlfriend, who missed your event last night, flowers?” Jess looked up only to glance at her boss as she smiled and picked up the first paper in the stack.

“Yes. Does that make me seem too forgiving?”

“Nope. Not at all. In fact, there are probably a bouquet on its way here because you guys are disgustingly cute.”

“She’s cooking me dinner tonight to make up for missing it,” she grinned, blushing at the thought. “So can we have me out of here by six?”

“You say that like I control what you do.”

“You’re the boss around here, and everyone knows it,” Lena reminded her secretary. “Kara once asked me to ask you to let me have a Saturday off.”

Despite herself, Jess chuckled and rolled her eyes. She understood how Lena was absolute putty in Kara’s hands. She was impossibly charming and polite and adorable. More than anything, Jess was happy for her boss.

“You just have a call with research at four thirty, and then I have some stuff for you to go over with the lawyers. I’ll have the driver waiting at five forty five.”

“Perfect.”

“I’ll go order those donuts,” Jess sighed.

“Thank you.”

As soon as she was out of the room, Lena went to the task of reading through the papers, carefully skimming them for mentions of herself, but more importantly, for Supergirl. It was important for Lena to know what was happening in the world, and gradually, that came to really revolve around the beautiful hero.

Very casually, Lena trimmed the front page that included a picture of Supergirl, somewhat sooty and carrying a few children from a burning building. She put the article into her bag and resumed perusing, careful to throw out the hacked up one first.

Now I have to think about that all day, Kara finally messaged back.

With a contented sigh, Lena slumped back in her chair and felt her heart grow bigger and bigger.

* * *

By now, Kara should have known not to play with fire, but Lena Luthor was so damn tempting and perfect that she couldn’t help herself because the burn felt so damn good, it was damn near addicting.

And thus, she ended up thinking about the little red lace that would clad Lena’s pale hips. She spent an inordinate amount of time thinking about the way almost no lace at all would cover her chest, and how absolutely stunning the entire production was going to be. For hours, that was all Kara could really think about, and she knew that Lena knew that would be the case.

Even donuts didn’t dissuade her… for long. She got about a two minute lapse.

By the time she made it home, she’d dropped the bag of groceries, nearly destroyed her door, knocked over a neighbor, and was all but evicted from the office for being useless. That was the power Lena Luthor held.

“Hey gorgeous, I brought wine and a few things of work that Jess made me bring home,” Lena called, letting herself into Kara’s apartment.

“Hi! Hi, hi,” Kara jumped slightly as she opened the oven to take out the dinner she’d put together. “Dinner’s almost ready.”

“It smells amazing,” she smiled, tossing her bag on the couch and hanging her coat on the door.

It was when the heels were tossed by the door that Kara chanced a look over at Lena. She watched Lena tilt her head and rub her neck attempting to get the soreness out of it before giving Kara a smile.

“You look very pretty,” Kara offered.

“Keep talking like that and it will get you everywhere, Ms. Danvers.”

“I hope so.”

Kara finally earned a kiss as Lena moved around her in the kitchen to get the glasses for wine. She tilted her head and prolonged her girlfriend’s lips.

“Wonder why you’re talking so sweet tonight.”

“Someone sent me a dirty text and it distracted me all day,” the hero complained as arms slid around her stomach while she stirred a pot.

It didn’t help that lips smiled and kissed the back of her neck. It didn’t help to have Lena pressed up against her back. But she didn’t want to feel anything else.

“How was telling you what underwear I’d be wearing a dirty text?” Lena feigned, kissing Kara’s shoulder and pushing away finally.

“You know how.”

“Did I really distract you all day?”

“You know you did,” Kara accused, earning a satisfied smirk.

“Glad to know I can still do that to you, darling.”

Lena filled the glasses and took her seat at the island, enjoying the sight of Kara cooking while she sipped her wine and flexed her toes, allowing herself to relax for the day. It was easy, and she never knew how to admit that she liked coming to Kara’s place because it felt lived in and warm and like all stress disappeared at the door.

Just like that they settled into their night. Though Kara never stopped thinking about the text, and Lena never stopped being smug about that.

“Can you set the table?” Kara asked as Lena explained her day at work. “I’m just going to pull out the chicken.”

“If you didn’t make such mess with your work.”

“I had a lot to catch up on,” she whined.

“And what are you working on next, reporter?” Lena asked, finishing her first glass of wine and meandering toward the table that was already full of Kara’s notebook and a few folders.

“Just some environmental stuff,” Kara called as she finished draining something in the sink, steam billowing up around her. “Would LCorp like to make a statement about the new initiative the city developed to combat global warming?”

“We are definitely anti-global warming.”

Kara chuckled and pulled out plates and waited.

“I was hoping for something a little more in depth. I remember you mentioning a new recycling program and an effort to be paperless in the next… five… years,” she trailed off, seeing Lena tenderly holding a news clipping. “It’s not– I didn’t– It’s– see what happened– I’m not a stalker.”

Emotionless, Lena stood there in Kara’s dining room and held a newspaper article about her fundraiser. She’d quickly flipped past it that very morning in search of more interesting news, but now she was holding the tiny picture of herself and the words that applauded her efforts. For some reason it was tucked in her girlfriend’s datebook.

“This is me,” she murmured.

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Um,” Kara scratched her neck nervously, afraid of the answer. “I just liked the picture.”

Lena looked up at her girlfriend and furrowed, not buying it, but not quite sure what to ask or say. So she looked at the article, trimmed perfectly and squared, and then at Kara again.

“You kept this?” she smiled, awed and confused by how absolutely warm her heart felt at the idea of it.

“I keep a lot of them,” Kara shrugged.

“What?”

“I keep a lot of your articles.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know,” she shrugged again. “I like seeing all the good things people said about you. I like to keep it in case you need to remember that you’re loved.”

“A lot of them?”

“Yeah, a few. From time to time.”

“You kept my positive press?” Lena shook her head, smiling wider in disbelief.

“Yeah.”

“Can I see it?”

“You want to– I mean– I didn’t– are you sure?”

“I just can’t believe you found more than one nice thing the press ever said about me,” Lena shrugged.

“I found a few things,” Kara offered, moving toward her bookshelf. “I just kept what I found. And I think it’s important that you see yourself and how good you are to everyone.”

With a roll of her eyes, Lena filled up her glass a little bit more and waited for a book to be placed in front of her, though her girlfriend dallied slightly, fingering the edges nervously, her cheeks burning bright red.

“Oh come on, Kara. I’m sure it’s perfect.”

“It’s actually mortifying, to be honest.”

“You don’t think I have a special book for all of Supergirl’s exploits and Kara Danver’s articles?”

“Wait, what?”

“Let me see.”

“Do you really?”

“Of course I do. Now let me see.”

Begrudgingly, Kara turned over the book and gulped as Lena started to flip through it. It was absolutely embarrassing, but then Lena’s face softened, and Kara felt good. It only grew as she flipped a few pages, pausing to read a few articles.

“You saved all of these?” Lena asked, furrowing slightly. “This is from… this is from four years ago.”

“Yeah.”

“We’ve only been dating two years.”

“Yeah.”

“Oh, Kara,” Lena sighed.

“You’ve always been spectacular to me. Even when we were just friend.”

Nervously, Kara rubbed the back of her neck and refused to meet Lena’s eyes. She didn’t say anything else, just got up and hugged her as tightly as she could.


	6. Halloween

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lena and Kara dress up as each other for Halloween without planning it.

“I’m not going.”

“You are.”

“I’m not.”

“You are,” Alex said, hands firmly on her hips. “If I have to go, then you have to go.”

“You’re going because your girlfriend is making you,” Kara taunted back before taking another big bite of pizza. “I don’t have one of those, and yours isn’t the boss of me.”

“She’s the boss of everyone. That’s what having a girlfriend means.”

With a sigh, Alex plopped down on the couch beside her sister with a new glass of wine. She tucked her legs up and surveyed the absolute gorging that was happening on the couch with no end in sight. Uniform still on, dirt from the most recent run-in with crooks and criminals on her nose and cheek and chin, smelling oddly like a shipyard, Kara chowed away in an almost state of bliss.

“I’ll be busy anyway. I wouldn’t want to ruin your plans.”

“Maggie is making me take off work,” Alex groaned and pinched her eyes against the tension forming.

She was given one job, and that was to get her sister to come because for some reason her girlfriend was worried both Danvers were becoming addicted to the job. And for someone like Maggie Sawyer to say that… it just really made Alex think.

“Wow. She must have you enchanted,” Kara teased with a chuckle.

“She’s making me wear a costume.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you wear a costume.”

“I hate them.”

“Then why?”

“Because, Kara,” her sister rolled her eyes and swirled her wine. “I enjoy having someone warming my bed and bringing me snacks at work. You compromise in a relationship.”

“Where’s the compromise?” she challenged, grabbing another slice.

“This one is more of a reward system-based compromise. I give her something, she gives me something,” Alex shrugged, her chest turning a little red.

“But like what could be worth a costume?” Supergirl asked between bites. “I mean, for you. I get it. I like costumes. Obviously.”

“Girlfriend favors.”

“Yeah, but like… what?”

Head cocked and eyes curious, Kara stared back at her sister who choked slightly on her wine as her cheeks grew warmer as well.

“Just trust me,” she sighed. “It’s worth it. And you’re going.”

“I’m not going.”

“You love holidays. Why are you fighting me on this?”

“I like normal holidays devoted to fun and joy, not scary things. I see enough of that stuff every other day of the year.”

Slightly forlorn, Supergirl shrugged defensively and adjusted her long legs as they were crossed on the table. Boots were kicked off on the balcony as she made herself at home in her sister’s apartment.

“But there’s candy. You love candy.”

“Yeah, but I can have that anytime I want.”

For a second, Alex mulled it over, because for once, her sister made a good point. She never expected to be someone who had to talk Kara Danvers into celebrating a holiday devoted to candy, but the reasons were real and made sense.

From the other side of the couch, Supergirl let her head rest back against the cushion as she got comfortable even further, burrowing against the long night and thankful to have warm food in her belly lulling her toward sleep.

Alex took another sip of her wine and cursed her girlfriend and the girlfriend favors she knew were on their way.

“Lena’s going to be there.”

At a speed just quicker than human, Kara sat up slightly and coughed on a pizza crust before making herself gulp a big swallow down and coming up for air almost instantly.

“What? Why?”

“Maggie and her hang out sometimes. It’s this weird, almost arrested, but I admire you kind of friendship. I think it’s good for them, to be honest.”

Not really hearing her sister’s answer, Kara pursed her lips and stared at the television, which, luckily for Alex, played clips from the most recent tech conference where a certain Luthor shone above all others. Smiling and explaining a movement for advanced climate change technology with such passion it was catching, Lena Luthor earned praise from the pundits and Kara’s unyielding attention.

“I don’t want to wear a costume,” Kara finally blurted.

“You have to. It’s a costume party.”

“What’s Lena going to be?”

“I’m not sure,” Alex smirked and sipped. “You’ll have to come to find out.”

* * *

The party at Noonan’s was in full swing by the time Kara made an attempt to go inside. Brimming with people, it spilled out into the street with the rest of the chaos that was Halloween downtown. Lights blinked in orange and purple, while all manner of characters hung about, drinking and dancing, like a true spooky scene.

With a heavy sigh, Kara pushed through the cobwebs that littered the front door, and into the flashing lights and music. She went because she love her sister. That was what she told herself, but the true reason rested somewhere with Lena Luthor, and everyone knew it, though Kara refused to admit it.

She couldn’t afford to have a weakness, but she also couldn’t stop. It was infuriating.

And that was the reason she found herself weaving through the bar in search of something to take away the sting of being there. It would be ineffective against her biology, but the act of it was enough.

Warily, Kara looked around after she ordered a drink, nervously in search of her sister, or her friends, or anyone that she knew so that she could say she was there and then escape.

“Excuse me, miss,” a voice with an exaggerated, quick talking accent approached Kara’s left side. “I was wondering if I could get a quote. A beautiful dame like you must have tons to say.”

“Unfortunately, I can’t–” Kara swallowed her words when she turned to find none other than Lena Luthor standing beside her, grinning devilishly.

It took a second for Supergirl to deduce what the costume was, but when it hit her, she blushed and smiled. Wearing a big hat with the word “Press” tucked inside it, the fake reporter had everything a good old 1920s reporter would have. From the suspenders to the tie to the pencil tucked behind her ear. Sleeves rolled up and oddly beautiful in men’s clothes, Kara wished her drink had arrived before this new problem.

“Wow,” she whispered, against her own control.

“Do you like it? I thought it’d be fun to be a roving reporter, asking all the questions.”

Proudly, Lena looked down and surveyed her costume before giving Kara a dazzling smile, amused with herself. And if Kara wasn’t certain she was there specifically for Lena, she got all the confirmation she needed right there.

“It’s a terrifying costume,” Kara finally returned the smile. “We all know you’re biggest fear is being hounded by press.”

“I don’t know,” she shrugged. “Reporters are my weakness. My Kryptonite, if you will.”

They shared a look, a quizzical, troubled look, and Kara wanted to ask more, though she was afraid of the answer.

“I like it.”

“And what are you, Ms. Danvers?” Lena stepped back to appraise the white coat Supergirl currently donned.

“I’m a scientist,” she grinned proudly.

The shirt underneath her coat was slightly tighter and unbuttoned much more than normal. The skirt was a little higher than standard safety protocol in a lab would permit, but still, it was all there. A sexy mad scientist.

“I like this look on you a lot,” Lena declared, the humor slightly gone from her voice as her eyes roved the body unabashedly.

“Science had always been a passion of mine.”

“It seems a bit interesting that we picked these costumes.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because it means we must have been thinking about each other at least a little bit,” Lena grinned.

Kara liked that explanation. She had to admit it that she thought of Lena too often, and she couldn’t stop, but she didn’t know how to, and so she just took a sip from her drink.

“You’re a good looking reporter.”

“You’re a good looking scientist.”

For a moment, Lena looked around the bar before leaning a little closer to Kara. The music was loud, the people were crowding everywhere, and she could barely hear her over the murmur of everything else.

“Can I tell you a secret?” Lena whispered, her hand resting on Kara’s forearm. “I almost came as Supergirl.”

The heat from the hand travelled up Kara’s arm to her shoulder to her cheeks and made her heart do the weird fluttery thing it did when Lena was in the same room as her. She stared too long at her lips, and she couldn’t help it.

“You… almost… Supergirl? Why?” she sputtered.

“Because she’s one of my heroes.”

“One of?”

“You’re my favorite hero,” Lena explained. “So I came as you.”

For a moment, Kara couldn’t do anything else except lean into Lena’s touch. It was all slow motion. Everything. As fast as she could move, nothing was happening.

“Do you want to get out of here?” Kara finally managed. “I want to show you something.”

“Lead the way.”


	7. Temp

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Supercorp AU where Kara and Lena love each other but Kara’s afraid of hurting Lena so they’re not together, but remain good friends. One day Lena gets kidnapped by her mom & when they rescue her she’s got too much kryptonite in her system to be anywhere near Kara. Kara teaches her how to live with the new powers but Kara thinks it’s just a temporary thing. But they grow closer & Lena even helps supergirl from time to time

Debris flew all over the place. Glass shards and chunks of wood and smoke all littered the air, while the smell of gasoline wafted through the old warehouse compound at the edge of the city near the docks. As the battle finally stopped and the DEO agents moved into the area, subduing the remaining Cadmus mercenaries as quickly as possible.

There wasn’t much left standing of the facility after Lillian’s built-in escape measure. But that didn’t stop Kara from sifting through the rubble toward the middle pile, beneath the steel beams and concrete.

Supergirl, be careful, there was more Kryptonite than I’ve ever seen before in this facility, Alex rushed through the comms.

The warning went unheeded. Like a bull, Kara plunged through the debris, tearing it up until her fingers bled and her muscles ached with the speed and perseverance. But she couldn’t stop. Not when she still heard the faint heartbeat buried beneath it.

The closer that Kara got to the source, the harder it got for her to function. Her bones felt like they were breaking, her vision kept fluttering, blurry and in and out. But still, Supergirl persisted with it.

“Lena!”

The glass chamber held against the collapse, reinforced with special components to survive whatever they were doing to her. Still asleep, the machines beeped, signaling heartbeats that Kara couldn’t let herself believe. Her body ached and burned itself from the inside out, but she didn’t stop.

“Alex! I’ve found her. She’s–” Kara coughed and tried to swallow. “They’ve done something to her. With Kryptonite.”

_Stay clear! We’re on our way–_

“There’s no time.”

With a move to steady herself, Kara stood and tried to rip open the door to the container, but failed, most of her strength drained and used already. It didn’t stop her though. She continued through the shooting pains in her muscles. She raised her fists and pounded the glass with all of her might until it finally broke open.

“Lena? Lena, can you hear me?” Kara begged before rushing to yank off the restraints.

There was no sign of movement or acknowledgement, no stirring at all from the comatose girl in the box. But that didn’t stop Supergirl.

_There’s an ambulance en route. Hang tight._

“There’s no time.”

Frantically, Kara looked around at the piles of rubble and knew that no one would reach them. She looked back at Lena’s paler than normal face. She saw the green in her veins and she heard the heartbeat slow steadily. All of this superseded the vice grip that her joints were experiencing. Like someone as clawing their way out of her own skin from the inside, the contamination from the Kryptonite in the air, in the concentration pumped into Lena, it burned her alive and brought her wobbling to lean against a fallen pylon.

“There’s no time,” she reminded herself again.

Kara picked up the unconscious woman and screamed with the pain that came with the contact. But she didn’t stop. With a swift move, Kara tugged Lena’s lifeless body to her chest, picked her up, and burst toward the sky.

“Alex, get to the DEO as soon as possible. I’m taking Lena there.”

_She’s infected. You’ll get yourself killed!_

“Just get there.”

Talking became impossible. Thinking became unbearable. Every inch of her body felt as if it were being flayed, as if she was being cut a hundred thousand times, as if her muscles were being burnt as they were torn, fiber from fiber.

Kara didn’t remember passing out, or the few stories she fell onto the DEO balcony. She didn’t remember anything except tucking Lena against her as she blacked out.

* * *

Despite the hubbub of earlier, despite the length of the day and how it ate into the night, the DEO turned relatively calm when there was nothing left to do but wait. On the extra secure basement sub-level twelve, Even less bodies were allowed to be there. And as the day started upstairs, as the first round of people nursing large coffees swiped their badges and started the desks on their computers, Supergirl pressed her forehead against the glass that separated her from the intensive care unit and a certain Luthor.

Over and over again, Kara turned around the night and what happened. She tried not to think about the fact that no one knew what was happening with Lena, her best friend, the girl that she couldn’t stop thinking about, the one who made her smile, the one who she lo–

Kara clenched her jaw and fists despite the residual pain and weakness that came from her exposure and time in the sun lamp. All she could do was listen and watch the puffing of the lung machine and the peaks and valleys of the heart monitor.

There was still a glow to some of the veins beneath the pale skin of the girl in the bed. It would be impossible for to Kara to go close to her again. It was only pure adrenaline and fear that drove her to be able to fly them to safety in the first place.

Often, Kara would want to touch Lena. Most of the time she refrained. Sometimes, she would touch her arm, hold her hand, rub her back. Something, anything. Just the proximity was enough. Never before had Kara realized how much and how natural it was to touch her best friend.

“You should rest.”

“Is she going to wake up?”

“We’re not sure,” Alex crossed her arms and stared into the medical bay alongside her sister. “If she does, we’re not sure what the Kryptonite has done.”

“She’s tough.”

It was small and quiet and mostly for herself, but Alex watched Kara nod the affirmation, her eyes never leaving the woman on the bed.

“I know you want to go in, but you have to know that you can’t.”

“Do you know when the Kryptonite will be out of her system?”

“No,” she sighed.

“I have to be in there when she wakes up.”

It was only then that Kara turned her head and met her sister’s eyes. She was fury and she was pride, all rolled together, and there was no way that she wasn’t going to be in there, even if it killed her, which, to her sister’s fear, it would.

“We’re going to start a new round of tests in a few hours. Go get some sleep. I’ll stay.”

“I’m fine,” Kara turned back, swaying slightly before resting her head back against the glass. “She’s tough, you know?”

“Yeah, she is.”

* * *

Half-asleep, Kara didn’t catch the first movement of the limp wrist. She thought it was a dream, and tilted her head back, yawned a big yawn, and rubbed her hands over her face to try to fight the way sleep attempted to come for her. For the past week, all she had was naps, begrudgingly slipped into, and not by choice, but by pure exhaustion.

And every time she startled awake, Kara was greeted with an unchanging scene; the same machines kept their rhythm, and Lena grew weaker, somehow.

But she saw the second movement, as fingers shifted and tried to move. And Kara traced the arm up to the face that contorted in pain and fought against the air machine that forced oxygen into damaged lungs.

“Lena? Lena, Lena, it’s Kara,” she stood quickly, looking around for some help. “Don’t struggle. Just wait. Please. ALEX!”

Frantically, eyes finally opened and met Kara’s and she smiled before smoothing Lena’s hair tenderly. Completely disoriented with where she was and what was happening, Lena struggled to breathe, struggled to swallow, struggled to move in a body that felt foreign.

“It’s okay, Lena. Let us help. You’re going to be okay. I promise. You’re safe here.”

The words were just sounds though, and the girl didn’t understand so she struggled against the tube and the bed, finding some kind of control over her new arms and legs. The past was too foggy and the present too terrifying to pinpoint what was happening.

“What’s happening?” Alex came in quickly.

“She woke up. She’s fighting the tube. She can’t breathe. Help her!”

“Okay, it’s going to be okay,” she promised, moving toward the bed.

With careful movements, she tugged away the tube, leaving Lena coughing and breathing deeply.

A second later, Alex flew across the room, smashing into a cart full of supplies that flew everywhere.

“No. Don’t come–” Lena pushed and coughed.

She ripped the plastic rail on the bed and threw it toward Kara as she attempted to climb out of the other side, fumbling with weak legs until she righted herself, plastic tubes still dangling from her arms.

“Leave me alone!”

“Lena, Lena, calm down,” Kara held up her hands. “It’s me. It’s Kara. You know me.”

“Hurt me. Not helped. I can’t– what… no!”

The alarm sounded and the lights flashed. Like a frantic and terrified wild animal, Lena looked around fearfully. Alex groaned in the corner under the container. Red dots appeared on her chest.

“No! Everyone step back,” Kara urged.

“It hurts,” she doubled over and held herself, held her head and squinted her eyes against the pain that wouldn’t stop. “It hurts!”

Before Kara could do anything else, a beam shot out of Lena’s eyes and cut across half of the wall and ceiling, cutting wires and breaking lights and panels. Sparks flew around and the room went dark until the guns and tasers unleashed themselves in the direction of the perceived attack.

“NO!” Kara rushed forward, shielding Lena as best she could.

“What’s happening to me?” Lena whispered, clutching onto Kara.

Arms wrapped around her so tightly that it hurt. The squeeze and need for reassurance was a movement that Supergirl hadn’t experienced in a long time, and her greatest fears were coming to be realized. She wouldn’t open her eyes again.

“It’s going to be okay, Lena,” Kara promised.

“Don’t let her get me. No matter what.”

The firing stopped and Kara looked over her shoulder as J’onn stood there, telling his men to lower their weapons. The hospital room was destroyed, nothing more than debris everywhere. Alex pulled herself up and held her side, some ribs most likely broken.

“No one is going to hurt you. I swear.”

Despite the promise, Lena nodded before the excitement and exertion were too much, and she went limp in her hero’s arms.

* * *

“Hey,” Lena whispered when she woke.

The room changed. It was closer to a hotel, though there were a few medical devices remaining. Still, Kara remained in the chair beside the bed waiting for that moment. Afraid of it and all it might mean.

“Hey yourself,” Kara smiled and yawned, wiping the sleep from her eyes, still dozy and warm and sore from not sleeping in a bed for over a week. “Please keep calm.”

“I won’t move.”

“You can move. Everyone has been told to keep back, and this room is…” she looked around fondly. “It’s Super-proof for the most part.”

Still, nothing made Lena feel safe about moving. She didn’t even want to open her eyes, but she wanted to see Kara because that sight always made her feel better, and she was selfish.

“What’s happening to me?”

Her eyes were glassy and that broke Kara’s heart. Quickly, she leaned forward and cupped Lena’s hand, squeezing there before bringing it to her lips and kissing her knuckles. She rubbed the skin softly and waited until she earned a smile.

“Your mother was toying with DNA manipulation and Kryptonite.”

“Of course she was. I had nothing to do with it. You have to know that I would never want to hurt you… I couldn’t hurt Supergirl.”

“I know, I know,” she nodded, moving one hand to drag her knuckles against Lena’s temple which she leaned into, a tear sliding down her cheek and into her hair. “I’m just worried about you right now. And getting you better.”

“Did I… Did I hurt anyone?”

“No, no. Not at all.”

“You’re lying.”

“Alex is tough. Just a few fractured ribs.”

Lena closed her eyes as tiny sobs wracked her chest. She swallowed it down and tried to still herself but suffered against fear and guilt.

“You can’t hurt me though,” Kara promised with a smile, wiping away the tears. “Most of the Kryptonite is out of your body. And we hope that the side effects were just temporary.”

It was tentative, but Lena squeezed back to her friend’s hand. Kara kissed her cheek, her temple, her forehead and tried to stop crying herself.

“Why are you crying? I’m the one who got kidnapped. My company is probably falling apart, and I could have hurt you with Kryptonite in my body.”

“But you didn’t,” Kara smiled through the tears she didn’t mean to have. “And I was so afraid I’d lose you. But I didn’t. I didn’t lose you.”

Lena watched Kara say those words, and she smiled despite how painful it was to hear the fear there. She moved her arm only to tug Kara’s shirt and bring her lips closer to her own. Weak as she still was, Lena kissed Kara because she was close to unbreakable and because Supergirl was the woman of her dreams.

Even with it, she didn’t expect Kara to reciprocate so eagerly, but she did. She kissed her back and clutched as tightly as she could.

“You saved me,” Lena whispered.

“I always will.”

“Am I going to be okay?”

Kara pressed her forehead against Lena’s and nodded, hoping she was convincing enough.

“You will be.”

“You look like you haven’t slept in a month.”

“It’s been about five days, to be honest.”

Lena scooted over slightly and lifted the covers. Kara didn’t have the heart to deny her, and her own wanted to join her despite knowing that it was still going to be dangerous to be with Lena past this situation. But they both needed something, and so they looked to each other to find it.

“Don’t let her get me, please,” Lena whispered again as she settled against Kara’s side and enjoyed being wrapped in her arms.

Kara kissed her shoulder and nodded.

* * *

“Come on. You know you want to,” Kara grinned and wiggled her eyebrows.

She hovered, just over the edge of the LCorp building, the city twinkling in the dark below while the CEO crossed her arms over her chest and jutted out a hip, challenging the assertion of the flying hero.

“I won’t let you fall.”

“I never asked for powers. And I don’t have to use them,” Lena disagreed.

“It helps with managing them,” Kara explained. “Once you know your limits, you can restrain yourself better.”

“I’ve got it under control now. It’s been at least two weeks since I broke something.”

“It’s not about that. It’s about… it’s…” she struggled to find the word. “Do you feel like everything is just coiling tighter in your body? Sometimes you just have to get it out, and it helps to relax. You’ve never been curious about my view?”

For longer than she would have hoped, Lena stared at the hero as she shifted in the air, lounging amidst the stars and clouds.

“Unless you’re just scared,” Kara finally taunted. It was her last resort and they both knew it, but it was so damn effective.

With a clench of her jaw and a big sigh, Lena took off her heels and climbed to the bannister where she stood, her heart climbing into her throat as bare toes wiggled over the edge of an excruciatingly tall drop.

“I can run almost as fast as you and I can lift a school bus like it’s nothing. I can fly, right?”

“You forgot the whole blocking bullets thing, but yes. I’m sure you’re going to be just fine.”

Still unsure, Lena looked at Kara and steeled herself. Her temporary powers, courtesy of her terrible step-mother were a curse and a blessing. It meant more time with Kara. It meant feeling alive in new ways, but it also meant missing being incredibly human. She missed those feelings of normal. She missed knowing her place in the world. And to be honest, she disliked having ill-begotten abilities.

But Kara held out her hand and offered it with a warm smile, begging Lena to trust her. There really weren’t a lot of options other than to leap. That was what one did for Kara Danvers.

It didn’t feel like anything. Lena gripped Kara’s hand so tight she was afraid she’d break it, now that she was capable of such things. But her eyes were shut so tightly, she couldn’t open them and was afraid after taking the step and nothing happened.

“I’m going to let go now,” Kara whispered, her lips close to Lena’s ear.

“No, wait!”

“You’re doing fine.” With a little effort, Kara finally extracted her hand, and Lena wobbled. “Open your eyes.”

More courage than ever before was required, but Lena finally did and looked down to find her feet hovering a good amount away from the railing with Kara smiling beside her. She wobbled as she grew used to her actual predicament, but found it to be like controlling a limb, where a mild amount of thought went into it, but realistically, it was just thinking it, and her body did it.

Still, the hammering in her chest was deafening despite the success.

“Kara, I’m… I’m… Oh my goodness, this is…”

Kara looked on at Lena with amazement because she was beautiful when she was that happy. She watched as she shifted and moved, testing out her movements. The smile was magnetic, was giant and glowing.

For a while, they hovered, they flew, they climbed and soared and dove and experienced. Kara was Lena’s training wheels, refusing to be too far away. It was primarily for safety, but it was mostly because Kara was addicted.

“This is great,” Lena finally cheered, out of breath and excited. “I should have let you take me flying a long time ago.”

“I told you,” Kara chuckled as arms wrapped around her neck and the two were the only creatures among the stars above the clouds and the city.

Lena pressed herself against Kara and held onto her shoulders, clinging there despite her own ability to hold herself up. She didn’t care. She just wanted to kiss her again like she had the morning she woke up in a strange bed and terrified. There was nothing more terrifying than wanting to kiss Kara.

“What if this isn’t temporary, Kara?” Lena worried as Kara cared and pushed hair from her face, tender as ever.

“Then we’ll get to do this a lot more,” she grinned, looking at Lena’s lips.

“I can be okay with that.”


End file.
